2013 National Network Meeting

Why do some children succeed while others fail? The story we usually tell about childhood and success is the one about intelligence: success comes to those who score the highest on tests, from preschool admissions to SATs. In the new book, How Children Succeed, Paul Tough argues that the qualities that matter most have more to do with character: skills such as perseverance, curiosity, conscientiousness, optimism and self control.
In addition to his research, Tough will share about the lessons learned in IS 318, a low-income public school in Brooklyn, NY, where an afterschool program focused on chess changed the culture of the school and the lives of the students.
Tough has written extensively about education, child development, poverty and politics, and his articles on character education, the achievement gap and the Obama administration’s poverty policies include cover stories in The New York Times Magazine.